


Sunday Morning

by quipquipquip



Series: "No Dawn, No Day" Universe [5]
Category: Batman (Comics)
Genre: F/M, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-11-08
Updated: 2011-11-08
Packaged: 2017-10-25 20:52:05
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,059
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/274673
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/quipquipquip/pseuds/quipquipquip
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Tim had to think and distance himself from a situation in order to process things, but Conner was tactile and emotional. So the question that had taken Tim eight years to answer took Kon all of thirty seconds. Kon/Tim, within the "No Dawn, No Day" AU.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Sunday Morning

It was Sunday night, which meant that everyone in the tower was preparing to put their costumes and utility belts away and return to their less spectacular weekday lives. This meant a lot of packing and perpetually put-off-until-the-last-minute homework, which in turn meant that each Titan was holed up in their own rooms. Conner had zero interest in his homework---had negotiated with Bart to do his trig for him, actually---but he had parked himself in Tim's room, where _tons_ of homework was being done.

Robin's room was the quietest one in the Tower, and he expected that he'd done some sound-proofing to make it that way. Tim was a smart guy---smartest one in the group, easy. Kid Flash had read an entire library (and trotted out factoids whether or not anyone wanted to hear them), but he still wasn't as smart as Tim.

Tim was practical. There were good reasons why he was the one they looked to for guidance in crunchtimes, and it wasn't just because the guy who'd been the first Robin was _still_ the unspoken leader.

Conner was hanging out in Tim's room because when he was in there, the rest of the house was muffled, even to his ears. Tim valued his peace and quiet, and Conner could empathize. Sure, the team was great and all, but between Bart and Gar it was never quiet.

Krypto was draped over his feet, watching Conner idly throw and catch a tennis ball. It was a nothing movement, a way to burn through his limitless energy. Krypto was watching the ball with the kind of passionate intensity that only a dog could project on the things that it wanted to lovingly chew the hell out of. His eyes never left the arcs the ball made as it rose and fell again and again.

Krypto watched the ball, and Conner watched Tim. Tim was out of uniform, sitting cross-legged on his bed. He had his laptop balanced on his knees, hunched over it as he rapidly pounded out an essay. He had his back to him, so he could't tell if the sound of him tossing the ball around was bothering him. When Tim focused on something, he focused like _crazy_. Conner couldn't fathom what that kind of focus would be like---what it'd be like to consciously block out the rest of the noisy, messy, attention-stealing world.

Tim's t-shirt rode up the curve of his spine, baring about two inches of very pale skin between his shirt and the waistband of his sweatpants. Even that little strip of skin had scars.

Yeah, Tim was smart. He had to be. The rest of the Titans had powers, and most of them could heal, and/or deflect bullets. Robin was just a normal human kid, tissue-paper full of meaty pulp by comparison. He kept up with the rest of them, despite being a flimsy teenager who wasn't very big or tall or strong and definitely could not shoot lasers out of his eyes. And that? To Conner, that was pretty cool.

Not that he'd tell the Dork Wonder that, of course.

"Hey," Conner said, which got no response from said Dork Wonder. Typical. "Hey," he said again, louder, and then, _"Hey."_

Nothing. Tim's fingers continued to plink out a melody of clicks from his keyboard.

Conner sighed, floating leisurely up and hovering over Tim's head. Robin had his lower lip sucked between his teeth in surreally intense thought, hunched in what looked like a super uncomfortable position. He had earbud headphones in, which was why he hadn't heard him. Now that he was focusing on it, Conner could hear the faint melody.

A grin spread across his face. He tapped the top of Tim's bowed head.

And Tim reacted like the spaz that he was, flailing wildly. He would've kicked his laptop off the bed if Conner hadn't grabbed it for a hasty save. Training overrode all else, so Tim grabbed his forearm, jerking his headphones out with his other hand.

"What the hell!" Tim burst out, flustered. He let go of him, running a hand through his hair and frowning mightily. "Are you trying to give me a heart attack, clone boy?"

"Nah," Conner said with a wide grin that bordered on smugness. "I was just wondering what it was that you were listening to. Was that _Enya,_ man?"

Tim's face flushed, red splotches staining his cheekbones and spreading to his neck and ears.

"It helps me study. I work better if I've got background noise. Tell no one."

"Your shame's safe with me," he promised, raising two fingers in a boy scout's pledge. He wasn't the one that friends and allies called the boy scout, but it didn't hurt to take a few pages out of Supes' book, once in a while.

Unfortunately, giving him that cheeky salute meant dropping the ball. Literally. Krypto had been waiting for that very moment, and there was nothing quite like the enthusiasm of a super-dog. With a triumphant bark, Krypto launched himself at his ball---which had fallen in Tim's lap.

"No, Krypto! Bad!" Conner yelled, but nowhere quickly enough. The white blur of fur completely bowled Tim over, barking and wriggling and drooling. Which sucked, because the dumb dog had gotten him in trouble with Kory already, and he really didn't want to be permanently eighty-sixed from Robin's room. He didn't like to be interrupted, and he didn't like to be messed with, and he---

And he was laughing. Krypto had him pinned and was licking his face, and he was laughing. Being a little more serious than the Robins that had come before him---not that it was _hard_ to be a little more serious than Dick Grayson---it was always surprising when Tim let loose and laughed loudly.

Conner saved him from the dog, physically picking Krypto up, putting the tennis ball in his mouth, and shooing him off the bed.

"C'mon, Super Mutt. Off. Take your spoils and gnaw on 'em elsewhere."

Krypto curled up on the floor at the foot of the bed and did just that. Conner turned an apologetic smile on Tim, but it wasn't necessary. Robin was wiping off his face with the hem of his shirt, still laughing helplessly. Krypto had licked his hair into a gravity-defying cowlick that he would definitely let the _girls_ tell him about.

"Sorry," he said, sitting down next to him on the bed. "He doesn't listen to anyone, and I haven't found an obedience school that allows super-anything."

"It's fine," Tim said, grinning. "I should take a break, anyway. All work and no play, right?"

"Right," Conner agreed. He smoothed down Tim's slobbery cowlick, since he was a good and true friend. Only a good and true friend would save his skinny butt from possible humiliation around the ladies. Tim always seemed to have a girlfriend, but _how_ was one of the greatest mysteries of the universe. "All work and no play makes you the Batman."

Tim started laughing all over again.

And Conner liked that.

 

*

 

It was Sunday night, which meant that Gotham was a godawful mess. But to Tim, fresh from a horrendous globe-trot and flying with the knowledge that Bruce was still _alive_ , every inch of Gotham was beautiful. He didn't expect anyone else in the world to get it---how could they? His relationship to Gotham City was as complicated as any romance, but instead of missed anniversaries or screaming fights in the supermarket, Gotham punished him for not being around by trotting out its most miserable aspects. It was pouring down rain---the muggy, thick rain of late summer that coated the back of his throat with the taste of pollution and unwashed bodies whenever he breathed in---and only the B-listers were out to dance with the wailing cop cars. People used words like _cesspool_ and _cancer_ when describing Gotham, and while he agreed, it was still home.

In that moment, nothing could bring him down. Not the rain, or the crime, or the responsibilities that hung over his head like a piano in a Saturday morning cartoon. He knew that Bruce was alive, that Bart was alive, that Stephanie was alive, and Conner was alive. Almost all of the people that he'd lost, the friends that he'd buried before their time, were _back_. It was one part miracle, one part a reverse 'fuck you' from a universe that had done nothing but crap on him for two long years.

Tim didn't believe that Kon could be summoned with a thought---knew better; knew the current limits of his skill set, because he made it his business to know all that there was to know about Superboy---but no sooner had he taken two minutes to breathe in a deep lungful of rank Gotham air and reflect on the friends he had back, Conner was there.

He hovered above him, unchanged from his memory. Conner smirked at him, a flash of white teeth that said _I said something funny, so you should probably laugh. Because I am goddamn funny._

Tim hadn't been listening, though. He'd been too busy staring at him, frozen. Conner landed, Krypto snuffling and barking his own greeting.

And he was just…struck by him. By the enormity of the space he took up as a physical, flesh-and-blood person---by the dizzying lightness that flooded him when he finally, finally processed that he was _alive._ Kon's memory had been the heaviest kind of weight, hung with hooks of his regret and failures. He'd tried so hard to bring him back, so to have him there was so impossibly _good_.

Tim didn't care who saw, or what anyone would make of it. Before he could remember that Red Robin wouldn't do anything so maudlin, he pushed up on his toes and hugged him, hard.

"Tim? Buddy?" Kon's voice held exasperated laughter. He didn't draw away, even when the hug dragged into that awkward territory of long embrace. He rubbed a big hand down his back, squeezing his shoulder. "If you're trying to be all dark and grim now, this isn't going to help."

"You're alive!"

"We covered this, I thought," Superboy said, an eyebrow arched wryly.

Tim bubbled over with stupid happiness. Heavy on the stupid. "You were dead. Bart was dead. You don't know what that was like…and now you're _back."_

"Uh. I know. And so did you."

Tim finally made himself let go, the realness of Kon confirmed. He could still feel his unerring warmth through his gloves, and it made his fingertips tingle. He pulled back his cowl, huffing his bangs out of his eyes.

"I knew you were back," he said. "That Bart was back. But it happened so fast, I never…I never let it soak in. And when you found me in Paris, I was in a bad place."

Conner nodded, like he got it. Tim didn't think that he could---that he could ever understand how dark things had gotten, how dangerously close to the edge he'd skated---but right then, he didn't care.

He was back, and that meant he had more chances to get things right.

"And now?" Conner prompted, searching his bare face for any clues the cowl had hidden.

"Now…" Tim smiled widely. It'd been too long since the last time he'd had a reason to. "Now, I'm in a good place."

 

*

 

It was Sunday night, which meant that Conner was having dinner with the Kents. The tradition had developed after being a Titan had stopped sucking up his weekends and he'd moved away from Smallville. For him, family was a complicated concept, so most of the people that he'd earmarked as _family_ weren't actually related to him. He hadn't been born into a family, so he'd had to build one as he went along. The Kents had taught him the importance of a family, and he honored that by dropping by for Sunday dinner as often as possible. He always kept one ear open, though.

There was this joke among the veteran Titans that he had selective hearing. And he did, strictly speaking. He had to, because the sheer amount of information he'd have to process would overwhelm him. There were certain things that he always heard, certain voices that he couldn't tune out. Conner was a lot like a cat trained to come running when the can opener started whirring---no matter where he was or what he was doing, some voices got his full attention.

It only took two words to get him from Kansas to Gotham in record-breaking time: _"Kon. Help."_

There weren't many people who knew his 'real' name, much less used it. Tim was one of the only ones, because he was a man in the habit of knowing things. Unlike his dead mentor, the man who'd made knowing things into a form of art, Tim didn't squirrel away knowledge just to throw it out when he needed to. Knowledge was a weapon that he used very rarely, so 'Kon' was a fond nickname that Tim slipped into conversations every so often. He had a weird ability to take the names that Conner felt the least comfortable with---Kon, clone boy---and make them fit him better than Conner ever had or ever could.

He figured that he knew Tim pretty well. Better than most, at least, since they'd been best friends for ten years strong. He knew the ins and outs of him, his obsessive compulsive twitches and personal double meanings. He knew that Tim drank his coffee black when he'd hit that wall of tiredness that meant that he needed to be bullied into bed, and that he popped his knuckles and his toes thoughtlessly when he was reading, and that he cleaned and organized things when he was upset or grappling with something that was way out of his control.

And he knew that he didn't like asking for help. In fact, if he actually _said_ it, it meant that he was way, way past the point of needing help. It meant that he needed saved, and that he was relying on Superboy to have an ear open for that one choked, faint plea.

Good thing that Tim's voice was his can opener equivalent. He'd been helping Ma Kent set the table for dinner, but as soon as he heard him he was out the door before the plate he'd been holding hit the floor.

If Red Robin hadn't been lying on his back, exposing his red belly instead of the back of his black cape, he would've been difficult to find. He located him about ten miles outside of the city limits, barely conscious and beat to hell. Conner didn't need x-ray vision to see that he'd been given the ass-kicking of his life---the angle of his shattered left arm and the wet, labored gurgle of his breathing spoke to broken bones. The bird had gotten his wings clipped.

The smell of his blood scorched the inside of Conner's nose. Moving him would be dangerous, but if he didn't get him to a hospital double-time, there was a very real possibility that Tim might die. He was all broken up, and he was having trouble breathing, and there was so much goddamned _blood_ \---

"Kon," he wheezed, then coughed. He could _hear_ fluid in his lungs, and at that moment hated the sharpness of his ears. "Really bad day."

"No kidding," Conner said with a slightly hysterical laugh, trying to decide which parts of him were okay to touch, and what might collapse and cave in and break _more_ if he touched it. He peeled back Robin's cowl, his heart compacting painfully at his blown pupils and bloodlessly pale skin. "What happened? _Who did this to you?"_

Tim's cloudy blue eyes drifted shut, lashes trembling as he fought to stay conscious. No time, he realized. No time to be angry, no time to find whoever had done this to him and _ruin_ them. Conner gathered him up, trying not to jostle him too much, and started for the nearest hospital at the highest speed he dared.

"Nuh," Tim mumbled thickly, squeezing his bicep with his good hand. "Not Gotham. I…not Gotham."

Not Gotham? Tim didn't want to go back to Gotham? It was right _there_ \---hospitals and all. It was his home. Why the hell was he semi-deliriously begging him not to take the easiest route to help?

He wanted to tell him to screw himself, that he was getting the quickest care, but he'd been listening to Tim's commands for too many years to shuck them off as unimportant.

He always had a reason behind his plans, behind his orders, no matter how trivial they seemed at the surface level. When they'd been kids, he'd fought him on it whenever he'd dished out a command that Conner didn't understand. They were both stubborn, and taking orders had never been one of his strengths.

But he'd come to respect that Tim didn't _like_ giving commands, and trusting him hadn't ever gone unrewarded.

So if he said no Gotham, he wouldn't take him to Gotham.

"You'd better not die on me," Conner hissed at him, strangling his urge to hold him more tightly. "If you go, I'll---I'll---"

What would he do, really? What could he do, if death came a-knocking for him? Tim wasn't like the rest of them. If he kicked it, it was unlikely that he'd get an encore. It was bitter, that brief taste of what Tim had gone through when _he'd_ died. He swallowed down that realization, and the sourness of it made his throat squeeze closed.

Five minutes before, he'd been setting the table for Sunday night dinner at the farm. Now, he was holding his bleeding and battered best friend, and his thoughts kept jetting off in panicked directions. The only thing he was sure of was that he absolutely could not stomach the idea of failing Robin.

What would he do? What _should_ he do?

"Sh…shut up and fly, clone boy," Tim said, and smiled with teeth streaked with a pinkish film of blood. "'I'm too busy to die."

 

*

 

It was Sunday night, which meant---officially---that it'd been three weeks since Tim had called Conner in for a critical save. He'd been lucky---he knew that. He'd been lucky that he'd made it out of the batcave alive, lucky that he'd gotten when the getting was good, lucky that he'd kept conscious despite his injuries, lucky that Kon had heard him, lucky that he'd _survived._ He knew that. Tim was fully aware that he could have easily died, and that frustrated him. He was all about learning from past mistakes, but the fight that he'd picked that night had been one that he'd lost years before.

Damian had nearly killed him when he was a ten-year-old. What had he been thinking, going toe to toe with him _after_ puberty had hit the littlest Wayne like a ton of bricks? Even though he was only sixteen, Damian had five inches and a good deal of weight over him---the older the got, the more he resembled his father. Tim had avoided most near-fatalities in his life by being smarter than the average hood; what he lacked in size and strength he more than made up in brain power. He was calculating, and he was agile. He hadn't planned on picking a fight with Damian when he'd gone to talk to him, but when they'd hit that point of no return, he'd assumed that he'd be able to outlast him.

He'd been wrong. Tim had no idea how long they'd fought, but it'd been _too_ long. His muscles had seized up, his energy fizzling out, but Damian hadn't _stopped._ He'd kept going and going like there was no end to his endurance.

It had been surreal. It'd been inhuman.

When he'd watched a long slice across his chest knit up like it'd never been there, Tim had realized that Damian had done something to himself---something that cemented in the cold realization that yes, Damian _was_ the grandson of the Demon's Head just as much as he was the Son of the Bat. Bruce had given him one piece of advice on fighting that had never been wrong: no matter how good you were, there was someone better. Right then, Tim had realized that Damian was that someone, and that he was out of his depth.

And that if he didn't get the hell out of there, he'd kill him.

He didn’t know the details of what Damian had done, but he knew how to piece together a puzzle. Detective work was his forte, after all.  
Bruce had been dead for three years, and while he didn’t witness the killing shot, he had seen the body. Dick had seen to the burial, and Damian had flown off the handle and disappeared for two days. The police had wanted Robin---all signs pointed to him; they'd found him with blood on his hands, for chrissake---but Dick wouldn’t give him up. Dick chose to protect Damian, but the new strain between the law and the Bat was hampering their efficiency. Like it or not, while he stayed in Gotham, Tim was seen as a part of that group.

It'd frustrated him to no end, but he'd dealt with it. Public favor rose and fell. It wasn't the first time that the Bats were seen as a menace, and though this particular rut lasted for years, he thought that it'd get better.

But one day, Dick had sent him a cryptic email and left. It didn’t take a genius to figure out that something had deeply rattled him, so much so that he wasn’t seeking help from the tried and true venues. He was furious, but that fury turned into heartsickness when Dick stopped replying to his pings altogether. This, to Tim, had to have been Damian’s fault.

Honestly, he'd gone there just to talk. To ask him if he'd heard from Dick. To tell him that if he needed help, he was there. But he hadn't wanted help. Damian had lost his temper, and for the second time in his life, he'd almost beaten him to death.   
This time was different, though. The first time, Damian had been the outsider. He'd been in the wrong, and Alfred, Bruce, and Dick had been on Tim's side. Now, they were gone. He had only a scarce handful of allies left in the city. Gotham was falling apart, and for once he wasn't sure if he'd be able to save it. If he buckled down and tried, he'd have to be the Batman.

Whenever he thought about the steps that he'd have to take---the sacrifices he'd need to make, the deals he'd have to cut---he thought of the future vision of himself that he'd seen all those years ago: a tyrannical killer who'd used abstract logic to justify his actions. He thought about the graves he'd filled with friends and foes, thought about the cool press of the Batman's gun against his temple.

Healing took time---time enough for Tim to think. By the time he was moving around on his own again, he'd decided that he absolutely would not take the Batman mantle. Better the cowl hang empty than warp him into someone he refused to be. Yes, Gotham needed a Batman; no, it would not be him. By the time he'd weaned himself off the heaviest of his painkillers, he'd come to the conclusion that he wouldn't allow the guilt to lick up his resolve. Better to spend his energy wisely, saving those he actually could save. By the time he felt like he was starting to overstay his welcome with the Kents, he'd realized that he couldn't go home again.

Without his family, Gotham was too bleak. That begged the question of where he would go next, and what he would do now that he was a free-floating entity. He could go anywhere---he had money, notoriety, and influence. It'd be easy.

But for the first time in a long while, he didn't have a plan.

Conner had his own schedule to manage. He wasn't much of a 'boy' anymore, but he was definitely still super, so he was in high demand for any and all day-saving. He spent as much time as possible at the farm, but he gave Tim his space. He knew when he was around, usually---he was no psychic, but working with Batman for too many years had made him very aware of the presence of others---but he recognized when Tim was in a deep brood and needed to work through it.

But Conner was still the Kon he knew and---well. He was still his---he was Kon, which meant he wasn't very patient and highly delicate situations were, quite frankly, beyond him. He could wait for answers and contact for a while, but he wouldn't wait forever. His patience lasted almost three weeks exactly.

Conner found Tim out in the field. He'd been just sitting in the grass, _thinking_ , so he almost didn't hear him touch down.

"It weirds me out when you do that," Kon said without preamble, toeing away some rocks before he sat down next to him.

"When I do what?" Tim asked, blinking. His eyes felt dry and gritty. Maybe he'd been staring blankly a little too long.

"This," he said, gesturing at him with a flick of his wrist. "When you sit totally still for friggin' hours and zone out."

"I was thinking," Tim said, half defensively.

"I know, man. But you think harder than anyone I've ever met."

Tim snorted, rubbing his eyes with the hand not bound up in a cast. "Is that a compliment?"

"Dunno," Kon said, shrugging. "It just is."

He was sitting close to him---close enough that Tim could feel his radiating body heat, the heightened awareness of the exact distance between them. It was familiar. Comfortable. He swallowed hard, and felt himself sag with the miserable weight of it all.

"I'm not going back."

Usually, Kon would've exploded with questions. His reactions were never small. But he just nodded, so he'd already come to that conclusion. He'd given him the bare-bones explanation, then made him promise not to go after Damian. Tim didn't want to think about how that fight would've ended, since he knew that somewhere in the cave, Damian had the insidious lead box that held the K-ring. He didn't have much left that he considered his, so he wouldn't let Damian take a piece out of his clone boy.

He was cutting his losses. That meant dropping the fight with Damian and moving on---and _away._

"I figured," he said quietly, taking his round-framed glasses out of the pocket of his jeans and slipping them back on. "Since you didn't even want to be treated there. You worked out everything to move, right? Contacted everyone who's wondering where Tim Drake-Wayne disappeared to?"

Tim nodded. He'd made arrangements. Each call had been more difficult than the one before it. He'd called Lucius, called Gotham U and withdrew, and emailed Tam. He'd felt like shit about the last one, even though it'd been years since they'd stopped dating. He owed her a lot more than an email, but he couldn't have strung the right words together to explain.

Kon cupped a hand against the back of his neck, working at a tight knot with his thumb. Tim curled up further, like his hand alone weighed him down.

"This was never meant to be permanent."

He could feel Kon's confusion without looking up to see his brows knit together. "Staying here? Of course it---"

"No," Tim interrupted with a careful shake of his head. "I mean…Robin. Red Robin. All of _that_. It was supposed to end years ago. I told myself that, you know? Told myself that I'd be Robin until I went to college or Batman stopped needing me---whichever came first. But now I'm twenty-four. I'm in grad school. And Batman's dead. Logically, this is where it should stop. I could finish my degree and get a job in engineering."

The closeness and quiet between them went from companionable to strained, just like that.

"Yeah," Kon said, heaving a sigh. "You could. You'd be an awesome engineer."

Tim paused. Waited.

"But? I hear a but."

Kon sighed again. "But _anyone_ can be an engineer. You know how many people could be who you are in a cape? Nobody. If you want to take a break, I get it. I won't stop you. But if shit goes down, I don't care where you're at or if you don't want to run with teams anymore: I'll find you, and you'll suit the hell up and come with me."

Tim looked up, then. He searched Kon's face, looking for those minuscule tells that years as the second-greatest detective had taught him. Kon looked back at him steadily, his mouth set in a stubborn frown. He was all geared up for an argument, blue eyes furiously bright.

"What if I say no?"

"You won't," he said, with confidence. "Because you're my Robin."

And he was right. There was no quitting---not for him, possibly not ever. He'd fought too hard to become what he was now, and even if he hung up the red and black uniform, there'd be no shedding everything that he'd learned---or the people who had come into his life since he'd first put on the Robin costume.

"And you're my clone boy," Tim agreed, scrubbing his hand over his eyes. "Can't walk away from that, can I?"

"Nope. You're stuck with me." Kon paused, then seemed to rewind his words in his head. "I mean, well, if you really needed to, I'd---I'd respect that or whatever, but---"

Tim reached up, knotting his fingers in Kon's shirtfront, and jerked him down. He'd hit the same general size as the Kryptonian he'd been modeled after, but Tim hadn't grown past 5'6". He had to pull him down, so it was fortunate that he had the element of surprise on his side. Kon could have easily gotten away or resisted his manhandling, but he hadn't been expecting an attack from Tim.

He kissed him quickly, before he lost the nerve. It'd taken him too long to build up the confidence to just do it, so he'd seized the opportunity instead of letting the moment pass and sink away. It was clumsy, like they were teenagers fumbling with need and inexperience. The kiss had the same kind of urgency, tongue and teeth and more than a little bit of desperation.

It lasted longer then he thought it would. Kon didn't push him away, despite the odd angle of his craned neck and the little fact that his very male best friend was kissing him.

Tim was the one who broke the kiss, letting go of his shirt and bracing himself for the fallout.

"Just so we're clear," he said, slightly worried that Kon just looked dazed and befuddled. He hasn't anticipated that. Questions, yes. Anger, yes. Rejection, _definitely._ But not dopey confusion. "This means that you're right, and I'm suiting up again as soon as I'm healed enough."

"Oh," Kon said, _that_ argument obviously chased away by the fact that he'd just kissed him. He hadn't recoiled, jetted away, or exploded at him, so Tim focused on not making it into a thing. It'd been something that he'd wanted to do for a while, but he'd had too many reasons not to take that step into gray and complicated territory---starting with not knowing if Kon had any interest in men, and ending with him not knowing if _he_ had any interest in men.

When he'd been about sixteen, he'd hashed the whole thing out into a list of pros and cons. The list had been updated and reevaluated yearly, but it was only now, eight years later, that the pros had outweighed the cons.

For better or worse, Tim lived in his head. He was pragmatic. When he threw caution to the wind, it was to the surprise of everyone---especially _him._

"Did we just---?" Kon asked, after an overlong moment of processing.

"Yes."

"Do you---?"

"Yes," said Tim. Quickly, before he could quash the urge, he added: "Do you?"

Kon stared out at the fields, sneaking quick glances at Tim out of the corner of his eye. He rubbed his knuckles, then popped them. He was stalling, but---unlike him---Tim was nothing if not patient.

They were polar opposites. Tim had to think and distance himself from a situation in order to process things, but Conner was tactile and emotional. So the question that had taken Tim eight years to answer took Kon all of thirty seconds.

"Look," he said, like he was arguing a point. "There is no way in hell I would've put up with you for this long if I didn't like you. So I like you. So if we're gonna be a thing, we should be a thing. Starting now."

"Right now?" Tim asked, the corner of his mouth turning up with a smirk.

"Like five minutes ago, actually," Kon said, and nudged his chin up with one hand. He kissed him again, but this one wasn't rushed. It was thorough, answering all kinds of questions of how much he liked men, how much he liked him, and exactly what kind of like _like_ was.

Tim couldn't go back home, but that didn't mean he was going to end up stranded. No matter what, he still had his clone boy.

And Tim liked that.

 

*

 

It was Sunday morning, which meant that Kon had no intention of getting out of bed for anything less than a five alarm emergency. If something wasn't being blown up or invaded, they could call in the League's reserve members and let them have a shot at day-saving. He slept in, waking up slowly, and with several false starts. The first time he stirred, the clock blared 7:20 in red digital numbers. He'd glanced over at the mess of black hair peeking out from underneath the covers, deduced that his bedmate was still sound asleep, and had decided that Tim could use a little more shut-eye. The second time he woke up, it was to the sound of rapid typing. Batman-trained prodigy that he was, Red Robin had managed to get his laptop out and start working on his thesis without waking him. Kon scooted a little closer, his fingers curled loosely against Tim's thigh, and decided that wakefulness was for chumps who didn't save the world at least four times a week.

The third time he woke up, it was because Tim was holding a bagel under his nose. Kon bit into it, then rolled over and stretched, the bagel still in his mouth.

"Hrrmin," Kon said through his mouthful, waving at him sleepily. Tim's bedhead was friggin' awesome, as usual.

"Chew and swallow," Tim said, taking a sip of coffee from his chipped mug. It was his unspoken favorite, despite the blue paisley pattern on it. Or maybe because of it. That, Kon hadn't figured out.

He finished his bite of bagel, hooking his leg with Tim's underneath the covers.

"Morning," he repeated, this time intelligibly. He smiled until Tim smiled back by reflex. "What do you think of the place? I think the bed's got my approval."

"We're just going to say the headboard was broken in the move, if anyone asks," Tim said, that familiar old blush gathering in his cheeks. "But other than that, it was a smooth transition. It'll take a while to settle in, but…"

Kon followed his gaze, looking out the window at Metropolis. It was Gotham's cleaner, sweeter cousin. If the cities had been girls, Metropolis would've been the one you took home to meet the parents---but Gotham would always be Tim's first love.

"I think we're in a good place," Kon said, with feeling. He slipped an arm around his waist and dragged him further under the covers with him.


End file.
